Survival Food – How To Container Garden Year Around In An Indoor Greenhouse

Growing your own groceries is the best way to be both food secure and know that your family is ingesting healthy food. Investing time in growing and raising your own food, coupled with stocking up on long-term storage food is worth both the time and funds dedicated to the preparedness task.

When disaster strikes, you do not want to be among the panicked hordes rushing to the grocery store to find only bare shelves in each aisle. While owning copious amounts of land to grow crops and raise livestock is ideal, even those with hundreds of acres would struggle to grow the food necessary to sustain their family during the winter and early spring months.

If your garden stretches far beyond what the eye can see and you dehydrate and can the harvest, you will have all the food you need, right? Definitely not. Bad weather, a fire, or disease could wipe out your entire crop and barn in virtually no time. Growing all your food in plain sight of those wandering the road in search of food, or tantalizing community members who know you are expecting a plentiful harvest could cause your children to wind up with empty plates and growling bellies.

There is a surprising number of plants, trees, and bushes that can be grown indoors in plastic buckets. Miniature fruit trees may not produce the yield of full-size trees, but you can grow them year-round and help maintain a healthy diet by investing in an indoor grove.

Fruits and other plants that are not native to your region may never be tasted again if a SHTF scenario occurs. Not only will you miss eating some of your favorite fruits and veggies, but the absence of the nutrients the foods offer, such as vitamin C from citrus, could negatively impact your health.

Growing food indoors in plastic buckets also offers the ability to produce valuable bartering items. The offerings of both coffee and tobacco plants will be valuable commodities during a TEOTWAWKI (the end of the world as we know it) disaster.

Spending thousands of dollars on a greenhouse is not necessary to grow crops indoors year-round. Several prepper and gardening authors have shared their “on the cheap” greenhouse ideas via websites and books, but the enclosed porch concept by the “Survivalist Gardener” Rick Austin is my favorite.

Austin’s plan is not only perhaps the least expensive, it also enhances OPSEC (operational security) and does not require electricity to warm the structure even during the coldest months of the year.

I asked Rick why the greenhouse concept he based his Secret Greenhouse of Survival book on is not only so different from the conventional methods for building such a structure, but why it is the best route to go for folks concerned about survival.

“Just like in my garden, I didn’t use conventional greenhouse building techniques. Most greenhouses focus on the solar gain, sunlight etc. and are mostly glass or plastic, as in the case of hoop houses, and they really do nothing to retain heat in the cold weather,” Austin said. “My Secret Greenhouse of Survival is well-insulated, uses highly efficient glass, and has a great deal of thermal mass built in. The sun heats these thermal masses — like concrete planters and crushed stone floors — and then those thermal masses give off heat all night long. I have had the greenhouse in subzero temperatures outside, and the temperature inside the greenhouse has never dropped below 45 degrees at night, with no supplemental heat. Try that in a glass- or plastic-walled greenhouse!”

The Survivalist Gardener can even grow oranges, lemons, tangelos, and coffee trees in his survival greenhouse deep in the Appalachian Mountains of North Carolina. He and his wife Survivor Jane use the camouflaged greenhouse to grow their long-term food supply year-round.

The ‘Secret Greenhouse of Survival’ greenhouse concept created by Survivalist Gardener Rick Austin.

Excerpt from the Secret Greenhouse of Survival book:

“This is the ultimate sustainable homestead greenhouse, but it purposely doesn’t look like it. Imagine a greenhouse that heats your home in the winter; and heats your water; that grows five times more food per sq. ft. than a hoop house; that provides food for you and your family all year long; where your food grows in 3 dimensions; where you never have to use fertilizer; where you never have to use pesticide, and where you can grow exotic foods (i.e. citrus or coffee trees in New England); that allows you to start seedlings in the spring; that hides your solar electric system; and that can house your small animals or incubate chickens and ducks. All disguised to look like a porch on your home, so that desperate and hungry passersby would have no idea that you have food growing there. This greenhouse does all that.”

Growing at least some of your food inside in plastic buckets will help you become as food secure and prepared as possible. Even if enclosing a porch or building some other type of greenhouse is not fiscally feasible, buckets of miniature trees and plants can become indoor edible decorations on whatever scale space permits.

Before embarking on an indoor garden, create a space, nutrition and money budget. Browse the list of suggested plastic container gardening crops below and adapt the possibilities to fit your needs. Although space and funding might be limited, do not neglect to factor potential barter items into your greenhouse/indoor gardening plans.
Gardening indoors means engaging in a growing process without bees to pollinate the plants and miniature trees. Education, as always, is key. Learn how and when to manually pollinate your indoor garden, and take advantage of cross-pollinating plants.

Indoor Container Gardening Survival Plants

• Miniature fruit trees: apple, banana, orange, pear, fig, lemon, grapefruit, cherry, pineapple, tangerine and lime are recommended. Miniature fruit trees are also commonly referred to as dwarf trees on gardening supply websites and catalogs.
• Cinnamon trees
• Berry bushes: blackberries, blueberries, raspberries and strawberries
• Avocados
• Pomegranate
• Tobacco plants
• Coffee plants
• Aloe vera
• Kumquats
• Broccoli
• Guavas
• Kale
• Hops plants
• Tomatoes
• Potatoes
• Lettuce
• Peppers: Hot, sweet and bell
• Cucumbers
• Beets
• Herbs: Research herbal remedies and learn how to grow your own pharmacy indoors. Herbs not known for their medicinal properties can also add a pleasing taste to broths, wild game, soups, and long-term storage food.
• Swiss chard
• Carrots
• Arugula
• Sprouts
• Greens: Mustard and collard
• Wheatgrass
• Pole beans
• Rice
• Turnips
• Celery
• Parsnips
• Peas
• Mushrooms